So instead of visiting the haunting and extremely important Auschwitz we decided to get smashed last night and sleep in until 11am. That's twice now and I gota say, it doesn't suck. This time we didn't have the green fairy around to blame it on, just good ol' fashioned beer. A really cool outside bar that poured good beer and cider. They're less big on Absinthe here than in Czech Rep and much more hyped about their vodka. I guess some parts of the old Commy regime are still in place.
Speaking of parts of Communism that doesn't suck, Milk Bars. No, not like the post 1970's, A Clock Work Orange milk bars. These are basically cafeterias with government subsidized food prices. We ate in one this afternoon and had Hunters Delight (kinda like the sausage and sauerkraut Mom makes but with BBQ sauce and no potatoes...and delicious, or in this case, delightful), potato pancakes, coleslaw, tomato soup, and a water for about 9 bucks, TOTAL. Soup is less than 1 dollar. Paul, you would love this place. In hindsight, it's also a great way to find out what you like and don't like because if you order something and spit it out, you've only wasted about 35 cents.
We spend the day seeing the other important sights of Krakow and wondering the streets. Very cook place, Krakow. Pope John Paul II was archbishop here before he got the nod to come on down.
Now (CYNIC ALERT, be prepared to be offended or at least roll your eyes), as most of you that know me know that I don't have a whole lot of use for church and that I pretty much give the finger to any type of organized religion. That being said, I gota admit, the churches and places we visited today were absolutely moving. All of them were ancient, of course, and most of them have some pretty solid historical relevance, other than just being a church like so many Italian sites.
We visited the church that John Paul the II cut his teeth in. They have a plaque on the pew that he likes to sit and even an exact replica of the Shroud of Turin. The replica also touched the real Shroud so it's considered a holy relic too. Again, most of the Catholic tradition is a lot of noise to me, but the hocus-pocus stuff is really cool. For those of you that slept through/skipped Sunday school, the Shroud of Turin (and I very well may be misspelling it) was supposedly the cloth that wrapped Jesus Christ (not Jesus Jones) after they pulled him down from the cross and laid him in the tomb. When the cloth was removed, a perfect image of Jesus was left on the cloth. So, if you believe all that (and there are plenty of independent, read: not Vatican sponsored, studies that verify the age of the cloth and that the image is not made of paint or dye) you're basically looking at the only legitimate and accurate image of Jesus. Pretty cool. The real Shroud is only taken out and shown rarely so this was a very cool surprise. Seriously, read up on the Shroud.
They have a pretty nice accounting of the pope's death too. Apparently, a bunch of Polski's (turns out Pollock IS an offensive term) waited outside his window when he came to Poland for the last time in 2002. The pope had gone to bed but the people, fearing it would be the last time they'd see him, chanted outside his window until the old fellow got out of bed and waved. I think it's pretty ballsy to taunt the guy who's got a direct line to the man upstairs but what do I know. I know I'm pretty grumpy when I'm trying to get some shut eye and some pesky Polski's (couldn't resist) are chanting my name on the street. When the pope finally did die back in '05, they all meet (10,000 of them) again below his old window and fell in unison to their knees when it was announce he was indeed dead. Again, not for nothin', that's pretty moving.
We went to another church that, hands down, was one of the coolest and most colorful churches I've been in. Take that France and Italy!
Tomorrow we're gonna finish the walk we started today and head to the Jewish Quarter. Upon further review we decided to skip the concentration camp and enjoy our lasts days here without the depressing fog of the Holocaust.
Poland is awesome. Next up, my review of the people, atmosphere and city.
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